


Conversation Hearts

by vio1et



Category: Pentagon (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Fluff, M/M, Secret Admirer, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 04:35:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29147568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vio1et/pseuds/vio1et
Summary: Wooseok’s crush on Kino started when he and Kino exchanged letters introducing themselves. For Valentine’s Day, Wooseok decides to write him again.
Relationships: Jung Wooseok/Kang Hyunggu | Kino
Comments: 4
Kudos: 35





	Conversation Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> hi everyone! long time no see 🙈  
> truthfully, i have started probably upwards of 50 WIPs since my last fic and haven’t been able to see any of them through to the end which has been super frustrating for me, lol. i am taking kino’s bday post for wooseok as a sign from the universe to post SOMETHING though, so please enjoy some cliché secret admirer fluff OTL
> 
> this is definitely not my finest work but hopefully you guys enjoy it for what it is anyway lol as always, thank you guys for reading, liking and commenting on all my fics. it means a lot to me!

Wooseok is cold, dripping wet and his senior year sucks already. After an entire summer of sleeping in until noon, of course he overslept and missed his bus and of course his mom had already left for work so his only option was to walk two miles to get to school. Of course, it couldn’t stop there. Of course it had to start pouring rain when he was halfway there. Long story short: he was almost half an hour late for home room and he hated his life.

He trudges up two flights of stairs to his newly assigned locker on the third floor. Because of course he had to be tortured with one of the worst, most out of the way lockers in the school. To make matters worse, his old locker-mate had transferred schools at the end of last year, so he had to share his junky, inconvenient locker with some randomly assigned person he’d never met. It was like this day was designed to be some sort of sick attempt at artificial natural selection. The irony of fake natural selection is completely lost on Wooseok, who thought Charles Darwin and Stephen Hawking were the same person until he’d received a particularly embarrassing grade on a science test last year.

When he finally reaches his torture locker, Wooseok opens it expecting for it to be exactly how he left it after orientation, with just his and his locker-mate’s books. Boy, was he wrong.

His locker-mate from hell, as Wooseok could already tell he was going to be, had sectioned off the inside of their locker door with electrical tape, claiming both the top half of the door and the top shelf of the locker for himself. He had moved all of Wooseok’s books to the bottom shelf, and covered the top half of the locker with stickers and pictures and magnets galore. In his section of the door, he’d put up a neon sticker border along the edge of the door and electrical tape, three pictures of what Wooseok could only assume was photos of himself with his family and friends and a magnet of Sana from Twice. He’d covered the walls of his shelf with matching stickers and more silly magnets and even used a bookend to stand up his textbooks instead of just stacking them like a normal person.

Wooseok sighed, examining the decorations in their locker. He was messy. He just wanted to shove his textbooks and lunchbox in and leave. Who cared about what your locker looked like? He huffs, hoping he could just avoid his this guy altogether in person. Suddenly remembering how late he is, though, Wooseok quickly takes the comfort juice boxes he’d packed out of his backpack and shoved them inside, then grabbed his biology textbook. Much to his surprise, a folded piece of paper with his name written on the outside comes sailing out. He holds back his distaste, knowing the letter must be from Satan himself. Wooseok just shoved it into his biology book, then rushes back down the stairs in hopes of making it to home room before the period ends altogether.

After his home room teacher aptly scolds him for being late, Wooseok suffers through her drone on about the importance of staying focused during your senior year for another twenty minutes. He couldn’t take her very seriously. Senior year was already kicking his ass. He just needed to go home and scream into a pillow about it now.

His next class is art appreciation, something that is even more boring than it sounds once you factor in that his teacher had to be at least a century old. That’s another class for suffering, just like home room.

By Biology, Wooseok is tired and bored out of his mind. It was his last class before lunch, which Wooseok found comfort in until he remembered all of his friends had different lunch periods than him. He was going to have nowhere to sit like some sort of loser. Great.

His teacher is going on about lab safety rules and how they’ll have to dissect rats this year when Wooseok remembers the letter. He flips open the cover of his book and sees his name in big block letters staring at him once again. Wooseok opened it, not sure what to expect.

_Hi there, locker buddy!  
I hope you don’t mind me leaving this letter, but I’m not sure when we’ll officially meet in person, so I wanted to at least introduce myself this way.  
My name’s Hyunggu, but you can call me Kino. Everyone else does. My family moved here over the summer. I have one little sister, Minju. Since I’m new here, I’m trying my best to get involved, including going to this student council meeting first thing in the morning, hence why I couldn’t wait for you to come by and meet you.  
I’m an ESFJ and an Aquarius if those types of things matter to you.  
Anyway, I hope we can become friends! Let’s both have a great year.  
Kino  
P.S. If you don’t like that I took the top half of the locker, we can play rock paper scissors for it!_

Wooseok sighed. Kino sounded okay. He felt bad for hating him off the bat for no reason. Kino hadn’t done anything but put some stuff up in their locker, so mentally referring to him as _Satan_ suddenly seemed unwarranted. He took out a pen and flipped over the sheet of paper, beginning to write a reply while narrowly avoiding His own name.

 _Hi Kino  
You already know, but I’m Wooseok. You can call me Wooseok. I don’t have any cool nicknames. I’ve lived here forever. I have an older sister, Sojin. She’s mostly annoying. I’m not really a joiner, but I play baseball. Not really sure if that’s your kind of thing.  
I don’t really care about that stuff, but I’m guessing you do. I don’t remember my MBTI.... E... something? But I’m an Aquarius. What’s your birthday? Mine’s January 31st. Yours must be pretty close by.  
I hope we can be friends, too.  
Wooseok  
P.S. I’m fine with the bottom shelf._

Come lunch time, Wooseok trudges back up to the third floor to leave the note in Kino’s half of the locker. He half-expects him to be there, waiting for him, but the entire hallway is deserted.

He drops the note next to Kino’s silly bookend, then pauses for a second to look at the pictures he’d hung up. He hadn’t really noticed that morning, but Kino was pretty cute. He had the sort of smile people fell in love with.

Wooseok shakes off _that_ thought, then grabs one of the juice boxes he’d stashed in their locker in the morning and shuts the door tight. He’s about to go downstairs to the cafeteria, when he realizes he doesn’t really have anywhere to sit or anyone to look for. Instead, he just slides down the nearest wall and sticks his headphones in, deciding to avoid the humiliation altogether and watch Netflix instead.

The rest of the day goes by pretty quickly. He hated math. He hated history. He didn’t really like language arts either. His last period, programming, was the most excruciating of it all. It wasn’t the content itself that sucked, rather it was the teacher thinking his class was so much more cool and relevant than all the other classes. To Wooseok, they were all equally useless. 

When he gets home, Wooseok is immediately subjected to a hundred questions about how his day went from his mom. Just once he’d like to be spared. How many times could he tell her it was fine? Why did she just keep asking?

Once he escapes upstairs to his room, he finally feels some sort of peace. He was thankful it was the first day and he didn’t have any homework further chaining him to _that place_. He immediately opened his laptop, signing on to him and his friends’ chatroom.

 **GiantHotGuy** : IM HOME. FINALLY  
**yutoda** : how was ur day  
**GiantHotGuy** : It kinda sucked. I missed you guys at lunch a lot. where is everyone  
**yutoda** : dunno, after school stuff maybe? soccer tryouts aren’t until wednesday -__-  
**GiantHotGuy** : Sorry for your loss  
**GiantHotGuy** : Can we hang out this weekend? It’s Monday and I’m already dying thinking how long it will be before I can hang with people I actually like  
**yutoda** : ya  
**yutoda** : jsyk yanan was on like fifteen minutes ago looking for you i think he might just be on invisible now  
**GiantHotGuy** : Ugh  
**GiantHotGuy** : That kid’s so annoying  
**yutoda** : he’s ok  
**GiantHotGuy** : We haven’t even met him in person  
**GiantHotGuy** : Nev and Max would be disappointed in me for continuing to talk to this guy  
**yutoda** : we videochatted with him he’s a real person we just haven’t gotten a chance to meet  
**GiantHotGuy** : Or! He’s a 50 year old creep  
**yutoda** : that’s a little far fetched  
**GiantHotGuy** : I’ll message him if it’ll make you happy  
**yutoda** : thanks

Wooseok has to hold back a sigh. Yanan wasn’t from around here, which wasn’t really atypical for someone you met playing games online, but the kicker was he would never tell you _where_ he was from. He was always on voice chat or video chat, but as soon as you asked him where exactly he was or brought up maybe meeting one day, he would act like he had connection problems and immediately log off. He was more like an enigma than a human sometimes.

 **GiantHotGuy** : Are you there  
**princeyan** : yeaaah! what’s up?  
**GiantHotGuy** : Yuto said you were looking for me  
**princeyan** : i just wanted to see how your day went. i know you were worried about it :(  
**GiantHotGuy** : It was okay. Nothing I couldn’t handle.  
**princeyan** : good to hear <3  
**GiantHotGuy** : Are you only asking because you want to rant about yours?  
**princeyan** : no!!! i was worried about you  
**GiantHotGuy** : But..................  
**princeyan** : ...........  
**GiantHotGuy** : .  
**princeyan** : ghskdhska okay SINCE YOU ASKED  
**princeyan** : i have made ??no progress?? making new friends?? AT ALL??  
**princeyan** : i went to two different club meetings today and i tried to talk to a bunch of people at both and they just kinda brushed me off  
**princeyan** : and THEN at lunch i asked a group of people if i could sit with them and they SAID NO  
**princeyan** : i couldn’t believe it omg like WHO SAYS NO  
**princeyan** : i wanted to cry like i’m trying not to be a baby but how do you make friends if whenever you put yourself out there people don’t like you???  
**GiantHotGuy** : It’s not that they don’t like you. They just are put off by change  
**princeyan** : ughhhhhh  
**princeyan** : what do i DO

Wooseok pauses. He wishes he knew the answer to that. He hadn’t put himself out there as much as Yanan obviously had, but that was only because he hadn’t had the confidence to do so. He was afraid of getting rejected the same way Yanan had been.

 **GiantHotGuy** : Just look for people who are sitting alone, too. Don’t join a friend group. Start your own  
**princeyan** : ..... thats actually good advice  
**GiantHotGuy** : Is my advice not always banging?  
**princeyan** : no, it’s usually laughably bad. you’re just the best person i know to complain to without actually looking for any real solution  
**GiantHotGuy** : ...... Thank you?

Yan An signs off a few minutes later to work on some homework, which Wooseok thinks is a lie. No one had homework on the very first day. Wooseok wondered if he was in the witness protection program or something like that. He was always just disappearing for seemingly no reason. Wooseok just brushes it off, starting a game of Civilization 5 with Yuto to entertain himself for the rest of the night.

The next morning, Wooseok arrives on time for school and stops in the cafeteria to grab an orange before heading up to his third floor torture locker. Once again, a part of him expects Kino to be waiting there, but all he sees is a bunch of nondescript freshman he’d never seen before in his life.

He opens his locker to find a nice, clean sheet of paper on his shelf. He also notices Kino put up a new picture of him with a cute girl kissing his cheek. For some reason, Wooseok doesn’t like that at all.

 _Wooseok,  
How old is your sister? I can’t imagine she’s that annoying.  
I don’t really play sports, but I like watching them on TV. Maybe I’ll come see you play in a game sometime? Go..... whatever our school mascot is!  
My birthday is January 27th! They’re really close! We should share a birthday cake or something when the time comes haha.  
Also, you caught me. I do care about that stuff. I don’t take it too seriously, but it’s fun to speculate about. Two Aquarius is definitely a good sign for a friendship, I think! No one understands an Aquarius better than another Aquarius in my opinion. Just don’t be weird about communicating.... >__>  
Take the MBTI test again! I really want to know!  
Have a good day today!  
Kino  
P.S. Decorate your half of the locker! You’re making me self conscious._

Wooseok sighs, once again flipping the paper over and writing his response on the back.

 _Kino,  
My sister is five years older. She treats me like a baby. It’s annoying. It’s like she missed the part where I grew up.  
Ha. I don’t know how much I’ll be playing this year, but I’ll let you know. What do you like to do for fun, then?  
Just buy me a cake and I’ll share a slice with you.  
I’m just fine at communicating. You’re the one I’m worried about, considering you’re writing me letters like a freak instead of just asking for my number. You can text me at 678-9101 if you’re afraid of getting hand cramps.  
I don’t know when you’ll see this, but you, too.  
Wooseok  
P.S. With what? Am I supposed to put up a magnet with Momo’s face on it to match yours?_

He places the note on Kino’s shelf, then scurries off to homeroom to avoid being yelled at for the second day in a row.

His morning classes pass by even slower than they did the day before. His Biology teacher decides to start _actually teaching things_ which is by far Wooseok’s worst nightmare. Whenever the bell _finally_ rings to signal lunch, Wooseok has never been happier. The two flights of stairs are nothing when he’s excited to get to his locker and read a new Kino letter.

Unfortunately for him, whenever he opens his locker in excitement, he sees his letter is still right where he left it on Kino’s shelf. He just sighs, taking another one of his juice boxes from his shelf. He slides down his locker, puts his headphones in and resolves himself to spending another lunch period alone, watching half an episode of _The Office_.

Not even two minutes later, Wooseok hears someone clear their throat and looks up to see Kino looking down at him. Wooseok quickly pulls his headphones out of his ears and jumps to his feet to get out of Kino’s way.

“Hi,” Kino sings. “I’m guessing you’re Wooseok?”

“I am,” Wooseok replies. Kino was even cuter in person. He was just wearing a pullover and jeans, but Wooseok still thought he was at least the cutest boy he’d ever met.

“I’m Kino. Obviously. You’ve seen all the pictures by now, I’m sure,” Kino points out. Wooseok nods. He was a little embarrassed to be caught hiding from the cafeteria by his locker mate, but he supposed every one needed some alone time, right? It didn’t automatically make him a loser, right?

“I have. You have a lot of them. Your mom, your little sister, you girlfriend,” Wooseok lists off. God, Wooseok having no pictures probably didn’t help with Kino thinking he was a loser. He should’ve brought some just to show he had friends! He probably has a picture of him and Yuto _somewhere_.

“Oh, she’s not my girlfriend. Just a friend,” Kino corrects him. This was music to Wooseok’s ears, whether he wanted to admit it or not.

“Do you like her, then? She must be special for you to put her picture up,” Wooseok suggests. Kino shakes his head.

“I don’t really think of her like that. I have a bunch of pictures. I just don’t really know which ones to hang up,” Kino explains, opening their locker and grabbing a tiny bag of photos from behind his psychology book. He presents it to Wooseok. “I put up my mom and sister, obviously, but after that it’s hard to choose.”

Wooseok takes the photos out of their bag, softly thumbing through them. He liked seeing all these pictures of Kino with the people important to him.

“You should just put them all up. I’m not really a decorator,” Wooseok admits. He’d rather look at all these pictures of Kino smiling every morning than ones of himself anyway.

“Oh, no. You need to put up your own pictures! This is our little home now, you know?” Kino encourages him with a tiny smile. Wooseok just shakes his head with a tiny laugh.

“Trust me, you would rather look at these than pictures of me and my best friend. We’re kinda gross,” Wooseok warns him. Kino laughs, crossing his arms over his chest.

“I’m sure you’re both great,” he says decidedly.

“You don’t even know who my best friend is,” Wooseok reminds him. Kino shrugs.

“I trust your judgement,” he declares. Wooseok laughs.

“You shouldn’t.”

“Well, you’ll just have to introduce us then so I can see for myself,” Kino teases with a little smile. Wooseok narrows his eyes playfully. 

“Sounds like you’re trying to use me to make friends at your new school,” Wooseok decides. Kino nods enthusiastically. 

“ _Please_ be my friend,” he begs. They both laugh. Wooseok offers him one of his earbuds, and Kino eagerly accepts, sitting down next to Wooseok and leaning in close so they can watch the episode on his phone screen together. 

That had been the beginning of their friendship. Despite their differences, namely that Kino was optimistic and organized while Wooseok was bored everyday and didn’t own a binder until Kino bought him one, the pair grew close over the course of their first semester as locker-mates. Wooseok introduced Kino to all his friends, and Kino integrated himself spectacularly despite not having a lot in common with anybody at first. Before long, Kino had expanded his friend group far past just who Wooseok knew, but somehow he always wound up back with Wooseok and Yuto on Friday nights. 

For Wooseok, the closer he got to Kino, the more he knew his feelings weren’t even close to platonic. He ignored it for a while. Then, he’d started venting to Yuto about it. Wooseok constantly fantasized about telling Kino, but he chickened out every time. 

By the time Valentine’s Day rolls around, Wooseok is getting antsy. Maybe it was because love was in the air, or maybe it was just because Wooseok had developed an excessive fear of someone confessing to Kino before he did. To Wooseok, Kino was the cutest boy in their entire school. Wooseok knew he couldn’t be the only one who liked him. 

**princeyan** : you should just do it.  
**yutoda** : what’s the worst that could happen  
**GiantHotGuy** : Ummmm He rejects me and we have to keep sharing a locker.  
**yutoda** : you can just avoid him you know what times he goes to the locker  
**GiantHotGuy** : Having to spend the REST OF THE YEAR avoiding my own locker is kind of inconvenient.  
**princeyan** : idea!!  
**princeyan** : send him a valogram confessing your love!!  
**yutoda** : how is that any better than doing it face to face  
**GiantHotGuy** : That literally just gives him time to think about ways to reject me.  
**princeyan** : because on the card you won’t put any details that pertain specifically to him. keep it as general as possible!!  
**princeyan** : wait for kino to bring it up and if he starts to reject you claim that you must’ve TOTALLY MIXED UP THE CARDS because you meant to confess to [any generic hot person at your school here] and send him a card thanking him for being your locker mate. done and done!!!  
**princeyan** : but send some to your other friends too so it doesn’t seem weird you only sent him one if he rejects you......  
**yutoda** : thats kind of genius  
**princeyan** : THANK YOU!!  
**GiantHotGuy** : What do I write on the card if I’m trying to keep it generic, though?  
**princeyan** : i’ve been afraid to tell you this for a while, but i like you a lot. be my valentine?  
**yutoda** : simple to the point only mention the mushy stuff if he says yes  
**GiantHotGuy** : Right. Ok. I can do this.  
**yutoda** : a monkey could do this

Wooseok hated to admit it, but Yanan’s plan was pretty solid. At the very least, it gave him enough confidence to actually go through with telling Kino how he felt, even if it was through a dopey, cowardly way like this. He was sick of just silently hoping Kino would notice that he meant the way he teased him in a flirty way. It was time for action.

The next morning, Wooseok marched right up to the Valogram booth and bought five: one for everyone in he and Kino’s friend group. He addressed the first four envelopes to his friends and wrote goofy puns on the cards, then sealed them and put them in the box to be packaged and delivered. After that, all he had left to do was write Kino’s. He wrote his name on the envelope with ease, but once he was staring the open card in the face, he was suddenly terrified. He quickly wrote exactly what Yan An said to, word for word, then signed his name and stuck it inside the envelope, slipping it into the box with the others before he could change his mind.

He felt all weak in his knees and scared for the rest of the day after that. There was still four whole days before Kino would even read what was in that card, but his mushy brain was acting like he’d already gotten rejected. Whenever Kino sat next to him at lunch, like he did every day, Wooseok couldn’t stop himself from blushing and wouldn’t make eye contact with Kino the entire period.

After school, Wooseok stumbles up the stairs to his locker to put his books away and his stomach completely drops when he sees Kino already there. He needed to get over himself. He gives himself ten seconds to prepare, takes a deep breath, then walks up to him, just like he did everyday before that.

“Hey. Are you feeling any better? You were acting weird at lunch,” Kino asks, stopping himself from closing their locker door so Wooseok can put his books in. Wooseok nods.

“Sorry. I just feel kinda funny. Could’ve sworn I had a fever this morning,” Wooseok lies, taking his books out of his backpack and putting them away on his respective shelf. Kino frowns, pressing his hand to Wooseok’s forehead, then slowly moving it downward to check his cheeks, too. Wooseok just accepted it, knowing Kino wasn’t going to find a fever.

“You feel fine to me. Do you want a ride home?” Kino offers. Wooseok pauses, evaluating his options. He hated the bus, but being trapped in a car with Kino was his worst nightmare at he moment. He bit his lip, examining Kino’s photos in their locker as he did. Wooseok had never decorated, despite Kino constantly urging him to, so Kino had started to take his own photos with his polaroid to hang up in Wooseok’s half. Now, underneath all the usual suspects of Kino’s family and friends, were pictures of Wooseok and his parents and his sister and Yuto and everyone that mattered to him, too, all taken by Kino. _God,_ Wooseok likes him so much.

“That would be great. I’ll get home, like, an hour sooner,” Wooseok decides. He needed to get over his newly developed fear of one of his closest friends. It was pathetic.

Fortunately for him, that car ride was just what he needed. Wooseok sat up front next to Kino, and, at first, it worried him to be so close. Soon, though, Wooseok was reminded that Kino was still his friend. At one point, Kino had even reached over and rested a hand on his knee, and it didn’t freak Wooseok out in the least. 

He couldn’t remember exactly what Kino had talked about on the way home, but he remembered thinking he was _so_ kind. Wooseok didn’t think there was anyone out there with a bigger heart than him. He loved children and animals so much. He loved _people_ so much. Wooseok didn’t regret writing that card anymore. He wanted to tell him. He really, really did.

Wooseok will never admit it, but, when the big day arrives, he gets up a whole hour earlier than usual. He took a shower, spent a little extra time making sure his hair looked cute and even has a full on debate with himself about his outfit. He originally wanted to dress up a little, but he’d felt a little weird wearing a button-up to school. Kino did it all the time, but he was no Kino. He ultimately decides on a black turtleneck, black jeans, a sweater and his usual converse. He figured it was cute and put together without looking like a try-hard. He spends so much time trying to look cute for Kino, he only has time for a single slice of toast for breakfast before he realizes he’s about to miss his bus.

Once he’s at school, it’s the waiting game all over again. The val-o-grams themselves were due to be given out in home room, but Wooseok didn’t usually see Kino until lunch. It killed him to think there would be two whole hours where Kino would know how Wooseok felt and could just _think about it._

He pushes the thought out of his mind as he hurried to his own homeroom. There was nothing he could do about it now. All he could do is wait until lunch to see how Kino felt and work from there.

“You’re late,” his teacher snaps as Wooseok runs in right as the bell rang. Wooseok apologizes, then hides himself away in his usual seat in the back.

His teacher lists off some boring announcements about exams and placement tests and things Wooseok can’t be bothered to care about, then finally announces she’ll start giving out val-o-grams. Wooseok knew he wasn’t going to get one, but it still gave him all sorts of anxiety as his teacher went down the rows passing them out.

When his teacher gets to him, Wooseok immediately averts his attention elsewhere so it won’t be awkward when she doesn’t have one for him. He’s staring out the window whenever he hears _two_ val-o-grams be placed onto his desk.

His heart was pounding as he pulled the cards off of the candy they were attached to. He loved Sour Patch Kids, but he couldn’t even think about eating them at this moment. Whenever he sees Kino’s name signed at the bottom of the first card, his heart stops.

_Wooseok,_  
I haven’t written you a letter like this in a long time! Thank you for being my first and best friend here. I love you.  
Kino 

Not what he was looking for. Not at all. It made him feel pretty nice that Kino thought to send him something at all, but a thank you for being his best _friend_ wasn’t really what Wooseok had in mind. He sighed deeply and checked the other card.

 _I like your laugh, your smile, the way you talk, the things you say. I think your hair is cute, and no one looks better in an old hoodie than you do. I wish I had the guts to say this to your face._

Wooseok swallowed hard. At least someone liked him. It was embarrassing to admit, but the first thing he did was compare the handwriting on the two cards. When they were totally different, he somehow felt heartbroken even though his situation with Kino hadn’t changed since before he opened the second card. He supposed it just made him feel sad that somebody out there liked his goofy grin and his gross hoodies, but it wasn’t the only person whose opinion he actually cared about.

Contrary to every other day he’s had at school in his entire life, his next two periods go by quickly. In addition to dreading going to lunch making each second valuable, he had a lot on his mind and was trying to decide who had sent him that mystery card. Through two periods, he hadn’t really determined any suspects. He couldn’t remember anyone ever flirting with him or giving even the smallest indication they liked him.

When Wooseok arrives to his usual lunch table, he’s thrilled to see Kino isn’t there yet. He pops a straw into his apple juice and tries his best to enjoy the time he has left before he officially finds out that Kino doesn’t feel the same way. As soon as he spots Kino entering the cafeteria, Wooseok wishes he could go back in time and stop val-o-grams from ever happening. He didn’t want the confirmation Kino didn’t like him and he didn’t want to know someone who wasn’t Kino had a crush on him. Valentine’s Day _sucked_. 

“Can I talk to you?” Kino asks. He didn’t sit down. He was barely in range of the table. He just crossed his arms uncomfortably and looked at Wooseok, who was halfway done peeling an orange and terrified, whether Kino could tell or not.

“Uh, sure,” Wooseok replies, pushing back from the table and following Kino out. He reminded himself to act confused. He needed to make it seem like an accident.

Kino leads him to the back stairwell before stopping. It seemed like a random place, but Wooseok thought his intention was probably just to keep walking until they weren’t surrounded by people anymore.

“What’s up?” Wooseok asked. He didn’t know if he had the acting chops to pull this off.

“Your Valentine,” Kino whispers, looking at the floor.

“What about it?” Wooseok continues. Kino shifts awkwardly, obviously unsure of what to say.

“I thought it was really sweet, but I need to–”

Wooseok holds back a sigh. There it was. Nothing he didn’t already know.

“What are you talking about?” Wooseok says, furrowing his eyebrows and trying his best to seem confused.

“Can we please be serious for a minute? You’re going to drive me insane playing dumb,” Kino requests with a sigh. Wooseok doesn’t falter.

“I don’t get what was controversial about a val-o-gram calling you a good locker-mate. You sent me one, too,” he replies defensively. Kino’s entire face drops.

“That’s not what your card said, Wooseok,” he snaps back. “Please just be serious for a second-“

“I am being serious. What did the card say if not what I wrote for you?” Wooseok demands. He wasn’t sure why, but he didn’t feel any relief coming from Kino. He just seemed sad.

“It was kinda romantic, I guess,” Kino explains, spinning his backpack around his torso and unzipping his front pocket to retrieve the card and hands it to Wooseok.

“Oh, fuck,” Wooseok says quietly, re-reading exactly what he intended to write for kino. “I- I’m sorry. I was writing a lot of cards at once. I sent one to you and all of the guys and also _this guy_ and I guess I just got the envelopes-“

“Don’t worry about it,” Kino assures him. He didn’t really sound like himself. Usually he would smile or squeeze Wooseok’s hand or _something_. “I’m glad we could talk this through.”

“Me, too. I’m sorry-“

“It’s really okay. I have to go eat lunch with student council, but I’ll talk to you later, okay?” Kino alleges. Wooseok nods, then Kino disappears up the stairs as quickly as he possibly could. Wooseok felt even worse than he did before he talked to Kino.

The rest of the day goes by slowly. All he could think about was the look on Kino’s face. Why did he seem so upset when he was getting ready to reject him anyway? Wooseok felt like a jerk. He doesn’t even bother going to his locker after school, instead electing to lug his math book home to avoid the risk of seeing Kino.

The next morning, all Wooseok can think about while getting dressed is that mystery card. It was finally Valentine’s Day, and he was in an awful mood, but he figured he could at least make _somebody_ happy today by wearing one of his tattered, red hoodies.

When he gets to school, Wooseok has no choice but to go to his locker. His math book was heavy, and he needed his biology book in order to survive that hell class.

The first thing he sees whenever he rounds the corner toward the hallway his locker was in is Kino. Why was he so hard to avoid? Wooseok didn’t really have a choice now, since Kino had already seen him, so he just tried his best to approach him normally.

“Hey,” Wooseok says, opening up their locker.

“Hey. Happy Valentine’s Day,” Kino replied back, just as blankly. He watched Wooseok remove his books from his afternoon classes from his backpack and rolled his eyes. “Are you avoiding me now?”

“Of course not,” Wooseok lies. What was he supposed to say to that? You can’t just admit you would rather be flambéed than talk to one of your closest friends.

“Oh? You’ve been carrying around those books for a whole day now for fun?” Kino says with a tiny grin. “Guess this Valentine’s Day didn’t go how you wanted it to.”

“Not really,” Wooseok agreed. He glances at Kino for half a second, suddenly feeling like this was his one opportunity to get some answers about the way he acted yesterday. “Did yours?”

“Not really,” Kino parakeets, fixing his hair that had fallen into his face. He pauses for a second, examining Wooseok close, then sighs. “I mean, it kinda did.”

“How so?” Wooseok asks, closing their locker and zipping up his backpack. He was just looking at Kino now and, as intimidated as he was, he thought that was probably how it ought to be.

“I don’t even know where to begin,” Kino whispers, crossing his arms and leaning his head against the wall of lockers. Wooseok just looked at him, biting his lip and waiting for more. “You wore that hoodie for me, though, so at least I have that.”

Wooseok’s eyes widen, suddenly feeling shaken to his core. His first instinct was to run away, but he knew in his heart if he ever wanted to be with Kino they needed to talk about what happened yesterday.

“You wrote that?” Wooseok asks. Kino just nods. “The handwriting isn’t like yours at all, though. And why did you try to reject me on the stairs if you liked me-“

“I had my little sister write it. Why would I write you an anonymous love confession in my own handwriting when you have access to journals and journals of my writing? That would make me a complete dummy,” Kino snaps. “And I wasn’t trying to reject you. I was trying to tell you I wrote that stupid fucking card when _you_ decided to be a coward and lie to my face.”

“I did _not_ lie to your face,” Wooseok insists. Kino rolls his eyes.

“You just lied to my face about lying to my face,” Kino points out. Wooseok’s cheeks suddenly went hot with embarrassment. He wasn’t wrong. “I’m sick of lying to each other, so I’m going to be the brave one and tell you that I like you. A lot.”

“I like you too,” Wooseok whispers. He didn’t know why, but he still couldn’t bring himself to look Kino in the eyes. He was still afraid that he was pulling a prank on him. This was all just too good for Wooseok to believe to be true.

“That was a lot easier than anonymous val-o-gram hell,” Kino declares, to which Wooseok just nods in agreement.

Kino quickly realizes he was going to have to make the next move, too, and gently guides Wooseok by his jaw into an awkward, nose-bump inducing kiss that somehow made Kino happier than anything in the world. Wooseok seemed equally thrilled and embarrassed, hiding his face into his hands as soon as Kino pulled even a centimeter away. Kino laughs, running a hand through Wooseok’s hair.

“Is that offer to be your valentine still good, though?” he whispers, peeling Wooseok’s hands away from his face. Wooseok bit his lip with a tiny nod.

“Yeah.”


End file.
